Which Vegan Cheese Makes the Best Grilled Cheese Sandwiches?

I already shared my mom’s tips for how to make a perfect grilled cheese sandwich, but didn’t say yet which was my favorite cheese. My mom and I tested thirteen different vegan cheeses to see which had the best flavor, texture, and meltability on grilled cheese sandwiches! Here are ten of the ones we tried:

We used my honee sunflower bread and Earth Balance Spread for all of the sandwiches:

My mom made two kinds at a time and we took notes as we went along:

Both the Chao Creamy Original and the Follow Your Heart American had really good flavor, but they took a long time to melt. Even with my mom’s techniques of preheating the bread and covering the sandwich, it was still hard to get these cheeses to melt sufficiently before the bread got too brown. They did both have a great melted texture once they finally melted, though.

Next, we tried Violife cheddar block and Daiya Cutting Board cheddar shreds:

Both of these had great flavor and they melted beautifully. The shreds were a pain to get to stay in place at first, but it was easy to flip the sandwich once they had started to melt. The melted texture was pretty close to perfect on both of these.

We compared the Violife provolone block and the Daiya provolone slices:

The Violife provolone block was just as good as their cheddar block, with great flavor and perfect melting and texture. The Daiya provolone slices didn’t have as good a flavor and they melted way too quickly. You can get around that at least in part by using cold bread and not covering the sandwich during cooking, but the melted texture is too gooey and this is not one I would choose for grilled cheese when there are much better options available.

Next, we tried the Violife cheddar slices and the Daiya Swiss slices:

The Violife slices did not melt as fast as the block cheese did, but the flavor and melted texture were still very good. The slices are a little more convenient but they are not quite as good as the block (and the slices cost more). The Daiya Swiss slices didn’t melt as fast as their provolone slices, but I would still start with room temperature bread and not preheat it. The flavor was pretty good and the melted texture was better than the provolone, so I will buy this one again. (I love grilled Swiss on pumpernickel bread and this is the only vegan Swiss option available.)

Finally, we tried the Follow Your Heart pepper jack and smoked Gouda slices:

Both melted slowly like the FYH American, but they did have great flavor and melted texture. I will definitely buy the pepper jack again. I prefer the Violife Gouda (not shown here), but I am not a fan of smoked cheese. If you do like smoked cheese, the FYH smoked Gouda is a great choice.

I’m not including the Daiya Swiss, FYH pepper jack, or FYH smoked Gouda in the final rankings because they are such unique flavors and each is useful for that reason. I am including Violife provolone slices, Violife Gouda block, and Daiya cheddar slices because we tried them later. My mom and I ranked the remaining cheese as follows:

1) Violife Provolone, Cheddar, and Gouda blocks

2) Violife Provolone and Cheddar slices

3) Daiya Cutting Board Cheddar shreds (would have tied with the Violife slices but the shreds are a pain to use)

4) Follow Your Heart American & Chao Creamy Original (both would have tied with the Violife slices but their slow melting time knocked them down the list)

5) Daiya Cheddar slices (not bad at all, but would choose any of the above over them).

6) Daiya provolone slices (would not use them again for grilled cheese unless none of the above were available.)

There are so many great cheese choices now for vegan grilled cheese sandwiches! Comment below and let me know which of these is your favorite and why. Also, please let me know if we missed any great choices that you really like!